No HDMI, eSATA, or USB 3.0 in PC. No built-in monitor speakers. Bloatware.

Bottom Line

The HP Pavilion p6751c-b is an attractive, relatively inexpensive system-in-a-box with a bright, crisp 23-inch widescreen panel. It has the power to keep the budding multimedia hound happy, along with a price tag and warranty to keep the head of the household happy.

The HP Pavilion p6751c-b ($729.99 list at Costco) desktop is an attractive, relatively inexpensive system-in-a-box that comes with a bright, crisp 23-inch widescreen panel. It has the power to keep the budding multimedia hound happy, along with a price tag and warranty to keep the head of the household happy.

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Design and Features
The p6751c-b is a HP Pavilion p6000 series desktop that has a tower design with a decent amount of internal expansion. It has the usual glossy black front made of plastic, with matte black metal sides. The utilitarian design is nice enough to fit in with most rooms, but can do well enough under your desk. It's pretty quiet in operation, with the only cooling fan in the back. There is also has a fan cooling the CPU, but you won't hear that since it's buried inside the chassis. Inside there's plenty of room for upgrades, including one free memory slot, 3 PCIe x1 slots, space for two internal hard drives, and one optical drive. The system has an internal 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi card, so you can hook the desktop up to your home's wireless network. This setup is way more convenient than stringing a network cable from wherever you have the cable modem in your den or living room. There's a 1TB, 7,200rpm hard drive in the desktop, which is plenty of space to support an average family.

The back of the p6751c-b has the usual array of expansion ports: 6 USB 2.0 ports, a VGA port, DVI, and audio. A 15-in-1 digital media card reader on the front near the top of the chassis is convenient for the photographer in your family. As seen below in the performance section, the system has plenty of power to offer the budding photo hound. I'd like to see an eSATA or USB 3.0 port (preferably both) at this price point, but I understand that both technologies are still rare for basic consumers. I'd also like to see a HDMI port, since the monitor has a HDMI-in port. Speaking of the monitor, it's a nice, bright 23-inch display with full 1080p HD resolution (1,920 by 1,080), but there are no internal speakers in the monitor. You'll have to rely on the packed-in USB-powered speakers for sound. While the external speakers are more sonorous than the ones built into many inexpensive monitors, I still prefer the built-in speakers with HDMI-connectivity for a one-cable connection during setup. External speakers just look clunkier, and if the user really cared about sound quality, they'd get good headphones or a good set of third-party speakers after purchase.

The desktop has a boatload of bloatware on it, including the most common suspects: eBay, Netflix, Skype, Quicken/Quickbooks, HP Games, Hulu desktop, Zinio, Barnes and Noble Nook, Blio, Kobo, the list goes on and on. HP also includes MediaSmart software, which helps you navigate your digital life (photos, music, videos). I don't consider MediaSmart nor the other HP-branded support and setup utilizes to be bloatware. You can also file Norton Internet Security as "not bloatware", particularly since this copy comes with a 180-day (6 month) trial period. It would be better with a year to 15 months, but 6 months isn't too bad.

The p6751c-b comes with a 2-year warranty on both the monitor and the PC. This is a standard HP-Costco policy: one of the benefits of buying a desktop from Costco. Costco also has a much more liberal return policy than most big box stores: 90 days no questions asked, while other stores limit you to 14 days with some charging an open box/restocking fee.

Performance
The 2.8GHz AMD Phenom II X4 830T quad-core processor and 6GB of DDR3 memory contribute to the p6751c-b's quick multimedia scores. The desktop can complete the Handbrake video encode test in a quick 2 minutes 40 seconds and the Photoshop CS5 test in 5:40. Both times are quite quick for an entry/mid-range system, and both tests show the benefit of a quad-core processor for the casual user: you will easily be able to convert high-def videos to a format your smartphone can handle and edit photos quickly. The essentially show that the newer generation systems like the p6751c-b and the Editors' Choice Dell Inspiron i580-8139NBC ($499.98 list, 4 stars) have the power to do the tasks that digital media enthusiasts do everyday. The Dell i580-8139NBC did the same tasks in 2:23 for Handbrake and 4:15 for CS5. Contrast this with our Editors' Choice nettop, the Lenovo IdeaCentre Q150 ($399 direct, 4 stars) (12:31 Handbrake, 23:38 CS5). The results for all these desktops on 3D gaming tests were similar: single-digit and slow on Crysis, Lost Planet 2 won't run on these desktop's non DX11-compatible graphics. All three are perfectly adequate at displaying and playing back HD video from online streaming, and can even play back Blu-ray, if you have an external Blu-ray USB drive.

The HP Pavilion p6751c-b is a good choice if you want the complete "system in a box" experience. It has a packed in 23-inch monitor, which is easy on the eyes and the whole bundle is priced at $749.99, which is good considering the monitor. If you want "just the PC", take a look at the HP Pavilion p6719c ($499.99 at Costco, 3.5 stars), which is essentially the same desktop sans 2GB of memory and the monitor (for $250 less). The Dell Inspiron i580-8139NBC ultimately holds on to its Editors' Choice award, however. The Dell i580-8139NBC just has a better bang for the buck, considering it has future looking features like HDMI, better performance, and no bloatware.

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Joel Santo Domingo is the Lead Analyst for the Desktops team at PC Magazine Labs. He joined PC Magazine in 2000, after 7 years of IT work for companies large and small. His background includes managing mobile, desktop and network infrastructure on both the Macintosh and Windows platforms. Joel is proof that you can escape the retail grind: he wore a yellow polo shirt early in his tech career. Along the way Joel earned a BA in English Literature and an MBA in Information Technology...
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